Socrates
stands silent, without the house.
He
sways to and fro;
though
there is no breeze.
His
daemon speaks,
in
words of tantalising uncertainty;
warning
of danger, urging on with cue.
Within,
the revellers laugh,
intent
to entertain
themselves
with wine and song and jest.
They
miss his presence,
await
his profile at the door.
Hopeful
of his words, yet fearful too.
The
seer breaks his pose;
returning
to this world of doubt.
Regaining
his will and purpose,
he
looks about.
He
shrugs and enters into its flimsy reality.
It
is most unsatisfactory,
but
will have to do.
His
eyes peer into shadows
which
lie all about him.
They
reveal their remote origins
to
his mind
as
they obscure their immediate
intentions
from his eyes.
He
knows at last his will,
with
doubt he’s through.
He
wishes to advance;
move
forward in this place;
join
his friends within;
enjoy
their fellowship.
He
wishes much more.
To
pass beyond this place
to
enter into a richness
which
few subdue.
Socrates
bows his head
and
enters the festive hall.
His
presence fills the room,
the
party song falls silent.
Let
us speak of love,
dear
friends, he says.
Let
us praise the source
of
all life new.
Account
is made of Eros, ancient of days;
wisest
and most beneficent,
yet
maddener of men;
neither
spirit nor matter
–
but interlocutor between –
carrying
precious gifts
reconciliation
to pursue.
Socrates
is silent. Then he frowns
and
shakes his head.
What
truth was spoke
was
not spoke true enough;
weighed
down by quest for earthly ease.
Such
phantasms, he knows,
he
must eschew.
He
recalls an aged seeress,
Diotima
she was named.
She
once instructed him in love;
when
he was young
and
brash and wilful
and
fully self-assured.
She
cut him down a peg:
her
words he will review.
Love
is desire for beauty
with
good outcome;
life
leading to life and on to eternity.
Beauty
is next to Good,
and
supplies the defect
of
sight to restore
what
wisdom once knew.
The
end of love is fellowship of being;
union
with the source of life and hope,
attainment
of clear sight
and
understanding
sure
knowledge of beauty
and
justice true.
All
love and beauty
in
this world is perilous;
an
intimation of
what
lies beyond the veil,
an
incentive to kindness
and
spur to courage
but
also a nagging distraction
from
these two.
Then
in storms Alcibiades,
apple
of the sage’s eye;
yet
rotten to the core.
Traitor
both to tutor and to State.
Sure
of himself, overflowing with hubris,
ravishing
in countenance and thew.
He
berates his erstwhile lover,
speaking
of deceit,
how
he promised much, but gave nothing;
not
tenderness, nor comfort of embrace,
but
by cultured neglect all passion slew.
He
accuses the silent Socrates
of
inhumanity,
of
spiritual conceit and direst pride
being
impossible to live with or without:
his
friendship he does most sorely rue!
A
tear wells in the seer’s face;
but
he turns away
from
what he has loved,
and
always will love,
in
this world: knowing that the warning,
once
heard, he can never misconstrue.
This
spoiled man, he knows,
exemplifies
full well
(but
without spark of intent
or
glimmer of awareness)
the
power of love to pervert and corrupt,
when
divorced from its object due.
